I think this applies here, too.
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I’ll bet his entire inauguration crowd was watching!
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Did you see the bit where he referred to someone who goes by “CJ” and accidentally called him “DJ” and then said “or CJ, he told me he goes by either, but I’ll just call him CJ”?
He can’t even misspeak a single syllable. Instead, reality has to warp around his mistakes to turn them into fact retroactively in his head. Imagine being CJ as he was saying all that, being told what you said.
Why does the president lie about easily fact checkable things? Because lying about easily fact checkable things makes you president. People complain he’s a narcissist but our culture reveres narcissists.
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You have to remember that the most important audience member he’s lying to is himself. He’s a follower of the George Costanza school of denial.
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I’m not sure Trump realizes that history goes further back than the Obama years, despite his age.
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That would explain why he thought he won the presidency on his “first try.“
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Two of Obama’s earlier SoTU addresses won more viewers (48m in 2010 and 53m in 2009), too.
Yeah, but if you don’t count the millions of illegal immigrants watching Obama, Trump totally won.
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What is more concerning is that the Democrats are still playing to lose:
Trump’s speech was bad. The Democrats’ response to it was worse (The Guardian)
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I used to be baffled by people who felt Trump was somehow the more honest candidate - or honest at all, given how often and transparently he lies. But then I realized Trump is very honest about expressing his bigoted feelings, just not honest about, you know, actual facts.
And I think his followers love the former because he dares to say what they have wanted to say for a long time, but have felt constrained by social norms (which they decry as having to be ‘pc’). This is the honesty that they see and admire.
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Lie.
Watch media correct lie.
Blast ‘fake news.’
Repeat.
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Trump ratings down from last year. Sad. Low energy.
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Non-lowlights™
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I’m sure he meant that he had the most viewers ever for the SOTU address on a day before a super blue blood moon, a record that will stand for a yuge amount of time.
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“Lying to an audience of true believers who won’t care seems too simple an answer…”
I disagree. Occam’s Razor.
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JOE KENNEDY: Leader Pelosi approached me and said that she wanted to chat. And I said of course, and she pulled me off the floor. And then we kept going into her office, and then she kicked out her whole staff. And I at that point thought I was in trouble.
MCEVERS: He wasn’t in trouble. And when he figured out that Pelosi was asking him to respond to the State of the Union, Kennedy said he was thrilled and a little terrified.
KENNEDY: I had seen some of these speeches before and had thought, that’s the worst job in politics. Why would you ever do that? Of course when I got asked to do it, which came a bit out of the blue, I was honored to be able to do so.
More than a liar, a full-blown hoaxer and conspiracist. Racism, misogyny and corruption are all conspiracies*. When he’s not talking about these “popular” ones, he’s on about the more Alex Jones-y ones. His entire presidency is predicated on people not believing sources of real information because “you just don’t know how deep it goes!” Listening toan interview with a Flat Earther (Oh No Ross and Carrie), I couldn’t believe how much his rationalizations of a crazy worldview reminded me of Trump supporters. Also listening toIt’s Been a Minute’s interview with Kevin Young about his book, “Bunk” he made strong direct and compelling parallels with P.T.Barnum that I’ve heard casually all over the place, including P.T. barnum’s own pushing of racist beliefs through racist sideshows.
* to clarify, I’m not saying that racism is fake, but rather that the institution of racism is itself a conspiracy of racists against minorities, conspiring to spread false beliefs about them to shore up power among the racists and members of their group.
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No mention here yet that the most-watched, 1993, speech, was Bill Clinton touting his proposal for universal health care in the USA. The issue that he’d run on, and won on, and had very strong public support even from conservative voters. When that suddenly turned around was when I started to watch US politics, because it was such a clear proof that The People were no longer really in charge; things they supported could still fail under the assault of, basically, Money with a capital M. A quarter-century later…wow.
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I’m wondering if perhaps scorpion/frog fable is a variation of Grimm’s fairy tale “Cat and Mouse In Partnership” (wherein the cat demonstrates his true nature); Grimm’s tales are actually collections of stories whose origins can stretch back many hundreds of years.
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Stop criticizing him!
After all, Donald is a dreamer too.
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I didn’t watch or listen to Trump’s address for the same reason I don’t rubber-neck car crashes.
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